Memoirs of a Warlord
by asuitcaseandapaintedface
Summary: Because in every break-up, there is a winner and a loser. And he wasn't going to let her see just how much he lost, he was going to throw it in her face. Multi-part songfic to John Mayer's Heartbreak Warfare. BROtp.
1. Prologue

**BROtp. Spoilers for 5x7 The Rough Patch--and well most of Season Five up until then.**

**AN: The prologue for a series of inspiration that hit me based on John Mayer's song Heartbreak Warfare, not exactly a songfic as much as it is a lyricfic based on the different lines of the song. more to come.  
**

"_Lightning strikes, inside my chest to keep me up all night. Dream of ways, to make you understand my pain."_

Maybe it hasn't hit him yet. Or maybe all of the sex and booze has just desensitized him. He wants to believe the sorry excuse of the latter.

They really just did that.

And now he's watching her walk into the bar to tell everyone else.

But now he's wondering if their break up was an escape, an easy way out now so it didn't get serious later. He tilts his head in confusion trying to compute the barrage of second thoughts and feelings induced insanity. Theoretically, (theoretically meaning in reference to the Lily/Marshall theory) one did not just mutually agree to call it quits after one party of the couple persuasion has been in love with the other party for a year. Two awesome's cancel each other out, where did that load of BS come from?

He nervously runs his fingers through his hair now and desperately needs a cigarette, something, ANYTHING to quench this hole that's beginning to split his chest wide open. This is new. There's never been a hole before. Using the elbow of his suit—he'd have to burn it, he did not want to catch any 'I'm making a giant mistake' feelings later—he peered through the window of the bar to see what was going on.

Robin is casually explaining it to them; they had the whole conversation planned out before she even walked into the bar. How it was mutual, how they both decided it would be for the betterment of both them and the group, how they were smothering each other.

She isn't going to mention the pact they made. And he won't tell her how his heart literally exploded at the thought of beating _Ted _to Robin.

The coast looks clear now, Robin is done talking, and everyone looks to be thinking about what to say next. What do you say to that, the perpetual bachelor and bachelorette broken up, both single again? Even _Alan Thicke _looks to be stumped. But it was expected right? No one expected Barney Stinson to seriously date a woman, especially one the caliber of one Robin Scherbatsky.

He can't exactly decipher Robin's expression or anything about her at the moment. She looks okay, relieved almost over her words as Lily and Marshall begin to spit out incoherent sentences to make sense of the events that have just occurred. But there's something else there; he just can't put his finger on it. His vision is beginning to blur as the familiar aching, dull pain ripples throughout his chest, settling in, and claiming its territory.

He's making a huge mistake.

Pulling a small, silver flask from his jacket pocket, he downs the remaining contents returning the pain and emptiness to only a shadow of what it was two seconds ago. Reminding himself to refill his medicine, he straightens his tie, adjusts his cuff links, and throws the bar door open. He quickly swallows the bile in his throat for possibly his greatest show ever.

"Daddy's home."


	2. Lightning Strikes

_**Author's Ramblings: Finally updated it. If this line of the lyrics is there in the prologue, they aren't meant to be. I made that decision (if it's still there) before I posted it somewhere else and made the artistic decision that the line didn't belong there yet. So enjoy Barney's warped psyche!**_

"_Lightning strikes, inside my chest to keep me up all night. Dream of ways, to make you understand my pain."_

For the first time in months it storms in New York City, violently. And him? He's sitting on his balcony, drenched from head to toe wishing the wrath of God would just strike him down now. It's a simple task really. One good lightning bolt to this metal death trap of a balcony and he's gone. Unfortunately it's not exactly new information that he's sinned more than whole population of New York and heaven forbid New Jersey combined. He figures this ought to be more than enough for God to just do it without a second thought.

Then again he considers how selfish it is; why in God's name-oops, sorry Big G, he wouldn't want to upset him-would he wish that type of torture and loss upon his friends? Sure, they probably wouldn't exactly miss him too terribly much—he knows perfectly well Ted, Marshall, and Lily were fine on their own, fine without him. But who wouldn't agree that variety is the spice of life? He did make things more, shall we say, interesting? In more ways than one.

For a flash, a second, he wonders what _she _would think if something happened to him. Surely she was there when he got hit by that bus, but she was incredibly snarky, always making jokes to lighten up the situation at hand. During that same split second he decides that the pain he felt when the bus hit him was nothing compared to what he's feeling now. At least with the bus accident he had morphine and other various heavy pain killers; he's got nothing but his scotch and mindless sex to dull the aching in his chest now.

That's exactly what he's been doing though, mindless sex and scotch, and a lot of it. He's gone into overdrive now, sleeping with anything female under thirty that moves. The playbook? A ploy. When he had the "moment" with the gang and that one girl It hurt more than it help and he shut himself up in his apartment for two days with a bottle of scotch and a pack of cigarettes. Lily won't stop staring at him. Ted keeps making this weird mix of a puppy dog left in the rain and disgusted face. Marshall, well Marshall's face isn't much different than Lily's.

_She_ won't look at him.

And on the off chance she does? His chest explodes in a new fit of pain and he swallows down a sip of scotch. That isn't watered down with ice or soda. She doesn't show any feeling and it scares him. It was mutual, their breakup, so shouldn't this burning in his chest be mutual? He's beginning to wonder if he actually meant anything to her. This feeling, this whatever it is that is inflicting so much pain upon him is something he's never felt before, not even with Shannon. Now that he's sitting on his balcony in the middle of a raging thunderstorm he's learned to stop questioning it, stop doubting what he's feeling and just go with the insanity and the craziness that is about to ensue. _She, _Robin,is going to understand the heartbreak he's feeling and the twenty-something female population of New York City is simply just caught in the crossfire.

* * *

He swears he's going to vomit if he has to hear another word about Lily and Marshall's extravagant Thanksgiving dinner. Normally he wouldn't be so anti-holiday spirit. This year he simply doesn't have the patience to care; he's trying to show her everything and she isn't speaking his language. The holidays are the most desperate time of the year and the pickings are in vast quantities in the booths at MacLaren's. Anxiously he's tapping his foot on the sticky floor and running his fingers along his glass, stopping every ten seconds to watch the door, waiting for her to come in so he can begin the show. Lily is still excitedly gushing about the meal as Marshall uses over exaggerated hand motions to describe the turkey he picked out. Sure, he's listening, just enough to get by and make him look mildly interested in what they're saying.

The door to the bar creaked open again and he watched as she walked in and headed straight for the bar to order a drink. He can't stay and wait for her to sit down, no, that would pause his game, make him unable to move or breathe. Jumping up, he slid out of the booth and blew past her to the random busty blonde at the other end of the bar. It wasn't a coincidence he happened to be facing Robin as he propped an elbow on the bar and began smooth talking the chick. This girl was absolutely boring, stereotypically dull and just a pair of DD's to him—an easy lay. An easy pawn in his twisted mind game. Tapping the bar counter, he motions Carl to bring he and the "lady" a drink as he scanned the room. Several other prospects were scattered across the booths, some tipsily swaying in their chairs. Too easy. What's-her-name in front of him is chattering away, was it Carlie or Casey? He can't remember and he doesn't care.

Ten minutes later his tongue is down her throat and the overwhelming urge to vomit overcomes him. He wants so badly to feel something besides whatever is eating away at him—and her tongue in his mouth, but he continues, glancing across the bar at his friends once more and the disgusted looks plastered across all their faces except one.

_She's _laughing.

Laughing.

Everyone else turns to stare incredulously at her as she shakes her head and mutters something about "typical Barney." Surprisingly enough they all agree, turn back to their drinks and forget he's there at the bar frenching some random chick.

So he moves on, to girl after girl and finally ends up in the female restroom with his hand dangerously high up a redhead's dress and speedily turning this into a bathroom quickie. Before he can complete the deed the room begins spinning and the pain erupts in his chest again. He didn't drink THAT much, at least that's what he thought, and he quickly slides to the floor and holds his head in his hands. And when the sobs come? It's all he can do to not ask God to strike him down again when the aforementioned redhead sits down beside him and begins to whisper that everything was going to be okay. As she's silently comforting him, he wonders if this was a one-sided battle he wasn't going to win; he makes a note to re-strategize his plan of attack.

Who knew some of his bimbos had a soul.

* * *

_Thanksgiving_

He wants to leave now. Not leave, run screaming out of Lily and Marshall's apartment. She is so close it's almost unbearable and she's being the same civil and collected Scherbatsky she was when he got hit by the bus. A little hungover and completely restrategized, he ducks behind a doorway to take a burning sip of scotch from his flask and stroll back into battle.

It's almost okay until Marshall later announces he's so politely giving the fourth slap to Ted and _Robin_.

What in the _hell_ is he thinking? Robin is going to literally knock him cold and all they can do is look on as she and Ted argue over who gets the slap. In a lot of ways he has screwed both parties over, Ted more so than Robin. But what makes the situation even funnier is that he's watching them argue from a seat on the couch in between the two and he's flinching at every move they make. He reminds himself that Robin has no reason to want to kill him.

It was mutual.

They were going to be friends again.

But if that was true, why was he killing himself over her, to make her see he had a soul?

He has to stop playing devil's advocate with himself, he never wins.

Robin and Ted have stood up now and he continues to stifle a giggle. The laughter is foreign to him and it feels all wrong because for once it's genuine. For once, he's not putting on a show. It's then that he hears seven words from Ted.

"Because I'm still in love with you!"

Every gruesome act of murder that he can possibly muster up in his warped little mind is mentally committed upon hypothetical Ted. He resists the urge to throw Lily and Marshall's television.

"Do you really want to slap Barney so bad that you would lie about being in love with me?"

"I really want to slap him, okay?" Oh God thank you. Breathing a sigh of relief, he remembers why he loves her so much. She doesn't take crap and she knows it when she sees it. It's this reminder that gives him a glimmer of hope, that maybe she'll see through his crap, his act, but he wonders if his crap is too convincing.

No person should be allowed to say, well think, 'crap' that many times.

_**Abrupt ending? Maybe, I felt I had nothing more to say. Re-to the view?**_


End file.
